Love is Always Write Anthology Volume 2

suspicions there. I've been trying to work out the other spell she left with the compact," Kamala said. "But since we're sure of how the binding works, now, perhaps it won't hurt to let you try and—"
    "It can't be," Tam interrupted. "It can't be for— for that. "
    "Let me see it," Aeron said. "I think we all want to know what the mortal witch wanted with her very own pet fairy."
    Aeron felt Tam's silent reply as if he'd screamed it: No. Oh gods, no, I don't .
    ****
    Aeron sat down so hard his tailbone jarred up into his spine. "What did Khalil's magic smell like?"
    "Cinnamon," Kamala said, twisting the metaphorical dagger.
    The other spell, the page full of unclean dark magic, was certainly the explanation, and possibly even worse than they'd expected: a ritual for taking the magical essence of those bound to you and making it your own. As far as Aeron could decipher, it left the victim a husk, nothing but rotting meat, and the caster's magic altered and impossibly augmented.
    Which explained why Aeron hadn't recognized his own father's magic in that signature until he'd examined it closely. It had been nearer to Awela's fresh, silvery white flower scent, missing the cinnamon undertone. The spicy essence Emyr had stolen from a human cleric twenty-something years ago.
    "And to think, your mother might have smelled of strawberries, if she'd lived long enough for my magic to come of age," Aeron said with a small, hysterical laugh. He looked up, willed Tam to catch his gaze from across the room.
    Tam did, though it was obvious he would rather not.
    Aeron smiled unpleasantly. "Now you might, too. Evergreen, lemon, and strawberry. Just think of what you could accomplish, Tammas. Everything she ever wanted for you and more."
    Tam turned his face away, but not before the wetness pooling in his eyes caught the firelight.
    Aeron blinked away the stinging in his own.
    "The boy had nothing to do with it," Kamala said.
    "He called me here," Aeron said.
    "He didn't know."
    "It's a shame he didn't. At least when I still belonged to his mother, she wasn't accidentally invading my mind while I slept."
    Tam turned his back, facing the fire. He swiped at his eyes with the back of his hand.
    Aeron felt that stabbing behind his ribs again, up high. Everyone knew the tales of fairies gone mad from a broken heart; he wondered if that was what this cracking sensation in his chest, this buzzing in his head, must be. "Anyhow, what's done is done. At least I know why my father never warmed to me, I suppose. As for Tam's clever witch of a mother—"
    Kamala set down her mug so hard some tea splashed onto a nearby book. "Who were you to Megha?"
    Aeron stared. "What?"
    The woman glared, eyes like black burning coals set deep within her brown face. "Why should she care for your life over the advancement of her own? Of her only child's? Is it worse than what your people do to ours with much less reason?"
    Aeron sputtered, "It's different. The servants are happy at Court. I've seen them."
    "Because they've forgotten what they left behind, dining on magical food and dancing constant attendance to magical music. At least you remember yourself when you come here. Which would you prefer: forgetful slavery or an honest death, as you are and always have been?"
    Aeron slumped and glared past Tam's unmoving figure into the fire. "That would be cold comfort were I dead and my wings dried and powdered in a jar on Tam's shelves, I'm sure."
    "Don't say things like that." Tam's whisper was barely audible.
    Kamala only clucked in disapproval.
    Acid rose in the back of Aeron's throat. He couldn't be sick; who would hold his hair back, now? His heart swung. He wished he hadn't given voice to misdirected spite. He wanted to go to Tammas and put his arms around him. Wanted them to forgive each other, if only so that something in the world, in either world, would be true and honest, would be their choice.
    But how could it ever be? That bond, the voice in his head, the one that had by turns accused him of madness and made him believe that he was destined for something , was nothing more than his father's contempt given life.
    CHAPTER 5
    Aeron slept in his old tree that night, sitting up straight, popping awake now and then to find Tam's face in the window staring out at him, silently begging.
    The tree understood that he was distressed. It offered him more leaves, which Aeron accepted and chewed disconsolately. It didn't help, but he told the tree it did. No point